Indy’s Election Board Says New Equipment Will Make Ballot Count Faster, More Secure

(INDIANAPOLIS) – Marion County says new election equipment will allow it to count votes faster.

The county will spend $2 million on machines which add a bar code to your absentee ballot when it’s mailed to you. That means they can track whether it’s on its way or lost in the mail. It’ll also let the clerk’s office sort ballots faster on Election Night, which means faster results.

All Hoosier voters had the option of voting absentee in last year’s primary, but the combination of a deluge of ballot applications and postal delays led to complaints from many voters that their ballots didn’t arrive for weeks, or at all. Election administrator Brienne Delaney says the county doesn’t want to ever again be in the position of telling a voter, “We don’t know where your ballot is.”

And Delaney says the change will improve election security, by making sure replacement ballots only go in the mail when the original is genuinely lost.

The bipartisan election board approved the purchase unanimously.